Ben McKenzie: I'm an author and filmmaker. I spent the last several years documenting fraud and other criminal activity in the cryptocurrency industry. I believe we are at a point of crisis when it comes to crypto's influence over our legislative process. Recent reporting from just last week reveals a foreign company that issues a cryptocurrency used by major criminal organizations appears to have shaped Trump's signature piece of legislation, the GENIUS Act, while at the same time forging deep financial relationships with members of the executive branch.
@DoodleNessa I am so very sorry, you have been through it this year, I know your heart is breaking. Sending all the love, may your memories abide and comfort you.
The ex-wife of ICE agent David Brouillette speaks out: “He’s like, ‘I need you to lie about my character because what it comes down to is my character, I don’t want you talking about any of the abuse in our relationship.’ I told him I was not gonna lie for him, that I’ve waited years to speak my truth, I’ve been silenced long enough and now I need to come out with everything because a man lost his life. It was abuse not only to me, but to our daughter. Even being divorced from him, I’ve dealt with harassing phone calls, threats of him wanting to kill me. I believe this man was murdered. I believe David’s mental health played a part in what happened”
@LeoS1977@WollastonWntr63 I wish I believed this. I think many of them, as long as they believe they would be the ones to remain in power, would be just fine with democracy ending.
Krugman: "there is no legitimate use case for crypto. They’ve had 18 years to come up with one. ... Every one of them has turned out to be baseless. The only real use for crypto is tax evasion, money laundering, and crime."
https://t.co/pkJlTjs8dW
Let me tell you what just got reported, because you will not believe it until you see it laid out.
The Trump administration cut a billion-dollar tungsten deal with Kazakhstan. Tungsten is the metal we need for missile warheads, fighter jets, and computer chips. Trump himself got on the phone to close it. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick worked it from the inside, sending letters, leaning on the Kazakh president, lining up as much as $1.6 billion in federal financing.
Within weeks of those negotiations, investors tied to a firm partly owned by Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump took a 20% stake in an entity connected to the very same Kazakhstan project their father was negotiating. Around that same time, Cantor Fitzgerald, the firm run by Lutnick’s own sons, raised $210 million for a partner in the deal and pocketed the fees.
The fathers set the policy. The sons cashed in.
Six days after the Trump sons and their partners moved their money, Lutnick signed the final deal.
The reporting found one or both families have financial ties to at least 14 companies working with the government on critical mining deals.
The total federal funding flowing toward those companies tops $8.9 billion.
This is your tax money.
It is supposed to secure our supply chains and protect our troops, not pad the portfolios of the President’s children and the Commerce Secretary’s children.
This is the most corrupt administration in American history. It is not close.
We must keep digging, and keep asking the questions they do not want asked. Republicans in Congress are unwilling to lift a finger. Mike Johnson is running a protection racket.
Either we will end the corruption, or the corruption will be the end of us.
https://t.co/yFOl7zvOhC
Last year, protesters took to the streets outside an ICE jail in Texas. This week, nine of them were sentenced to decades-long prison terms. Elizabeth Soto received a 50-year sentence for owning a "printing press” used to print leaflets for the protest and "being part of a leftist book club." This is outrageous.
This case was the first tried and convicted under the Trump DOJ’s “counter-terrorism” initiatives. But Elizabeth and her husband Ines weren't even at the protest by the time the situation escalated and guns were drawn.
When we see members of this administration and its loyalists weaponizing the law to target protestors, what message are they trying to send to the American people? That dissent against its policies, dissent protected by the First Amendment, will be met with extraordinary punishment? It appears to be so.
https://t.co/9A7JST4WqH
James Robison
What Joyce Carol Oates wrote to Elon Musk on Twitter. I am told it rattled him. I love it.
“So curious that such a wealthy man never posts anything that indicates that he enjoys or is even aware of what virtually everyone appreciates – scenes from nature, pet dog or cat, praise for a movie, music, a book (but doubt that he reads); pride in a friend’s or relative’s accomplishment; condolences for someone who has died; pleasure in sports, acclaim for a favorite team; references to history. In fact he seems totally uneducated, uncultured. The poorest persons on Twitter may have access to more beauty & meaning in life than the ‘most wealthy person in the world.’”
Sec Hegseth fires four star US Army General CD Donahue commanding US Army Europe. Donahue clearly the most extraordinary combat leader in a generation. Brilliant. Fearless. Bold. Integrity. Incredible leader.
Pope Leo XIV says that the Catholic Church’s teaching on sexual ethics must be less prioritized over “greater, more important issues.”
“We tend to think that when the Church is talking about morality, that the only issue of morality is sexual. And in reality, I believe there are much greater, more important issues, such as justice, equality, freedom of men and women, freedom of religion, that would all take priority before that particular issue.”
Dear younger voters who went for Trump in ‘24, watch the speeches of Prez & Michelle Obama & Mamdani today then compare it to Trump speaking at the White House this afternoon. Ask yourself what kinda world you wanna live in & what real leadership looks like. Then get involved.
"I am deeply concerned about why such a large team is now necessary. The White House has so far refused to say who all those doctors were"
Top Democrat on House Judiciary Cmte is probing Trump health. New inquiry to White House doctor about reports Trump saw 22 specialists